


Thinking ‘Bout a Life of Crime

by wishonadarkstar



Series: Legacies [3]
Category: Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Father-Son Relationship, Gen, Precognition, The Force, Vignette
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-28
Updated: 2018-08-28
Packaged: 2019-07-03 15:07:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,490
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15821385
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wishonadarkstar/pseuds/wishonadarkstar
Summary: Father-son bonding, and the future.





	Thinking ‘Bout a Life of Crime

**Author's Note:**

> I probably should have said this three fics ago, but this series wouldn’t exist without saiditallbefore, aka the world’s best cheerleader.

They were huddled behind some abandoned shipping crates, under heavy blaster fire, when Han grabbed Ben’s shoulder.

“What the hell are you wearing?” he demanded.

Ben looked down at himself, then back at Han. “Clothes?” he suggested.

A nearby explosion had them both on their feet and running.

“Concussion grenades!” Ben shouted, dodging around the broken husk of some derelict cargo-sorter.

“Tell me something I don’t know!” Han replied from somewhere halfway across the scrapyard in the other direction.

Ben snorted and then dropped down into a crevice that no normal being would have been able to detect from the angle he’d been at, panting to catch his breath.

He waited for the group who’d split off to chase him to tromp past his little hide, then leapt out after them, getting three of them in the back before they thought to check behind them.

He could hear screaming from Han’s direction to indicate that his father was faring similarly well.

Once he’d taken out his group, he made his weary way over to Han, who had also done away with his pursuers.

“Well,” Han said. “That was bracing. What the hell are you wearing?”

“Well, since I knew we’d be running for our lives again, I figured I may as well give those guys a good view while I was at it,” Ben said, shoving his hair out of his eyes and grinning at his father.

“What, you couldn’t have used that useful foreknowledge to tell me what was up so we could instead dump the cargo and run for it?”

Ben’s expression slipped into a contemplative frown, and after a few seconds he shook his head. “No. They’ve retrofitted some cannons from an old Imp destroyer onto that awful rustbucket they live on. Would have fried half their systems, but they’d have killed us no problem.”

“Kriff,” Han breathed. “You’re a helluva guy to have in a fight, but some days you scare the living shit out of me.”

Ben grinned at him. “And that’s why you kidnapped me from my tenth birthday party,” he pointed out cheerfully.

His father sighed heavily, shaking his head. “Come on, I think you got grazed and I want to make sure it got completely cauterized or get some bacta on it.”

“Me?” Ben asked, examining his arms carefully and then cursing when he saw that his left arm had indeed been singed. “Well, at least it was just the sleeve. Easy to put a new one in.”

Han sighed and rubbed his temples.

***

Bactad up and back in the skies, Han knocked carefully on the hatch that lead to the crew’s bunks. He’d helped Ben clear it of all the junk it had acquired in the decades Han had been running on the ship, and had ripped out the extra berths to give him a little more space to work with once he realized that Ben really did enjoy all that sewing and hand-crafting crap that made absolutely no sense to him.

Ben answered the door with sleepy eyes and stepped back in a silent invitation for Han to enter.

In the close quarters of the freighter, Han tried his best to give his teenaged son as much privacy as possible, but Ben had yet to hit a stage where he wouldn’t let his dad in his room when he asked.

Han was vaguely aware that that was actually kind of abnormal.

“You know, I’ve been talking with your mother,” Han said.

Ben startled slightly, and Han thought with no little amusement,  _ didn’t know I could surprise you, kid. _

“And you’re both still in one piece and relatively happy?”

“No one’s more surprised about that than I am, son,” Han said slowly. “But then, we were talking about you.”

“You’re sending me back to her,” Ben predicted, and then he frowned, shaking his head slightly. “I don’t know if that’s a good idea or not.”

Han snorted. “Well, good to know at least one aspect of my parenting is left to me and not some mystic Force that knows no good or evil.”

Ben quirked a grin at Han, and if Han were a vainer man, he’d have been pleased by how much of him was in that expression.

Han cleared his throat, and then continued. “Thing is, you’re pretty good at this sewing stuff, and I’ve seen the drawings you do for stuff we can’t find materials for. You could be even better.”

“I don’t mind,” Ben rushed to say. “I like what we have, I don’t need some fancy synthsilks from the Core to be happy, you know that.”

“Are you?” Han asked, trying for indifferent and missing by a mile. “Happy, I mean. Because you’ve been getting into worse and worse fights when I can’t see you, and the other day when that Rellian was insulting you, every glass and bottle in the bar exploded all at once. That was the other thing. I think maybe you  _ should _ spend a summer with your Uncle Luke--”

“No!” Ben snapped, and his eyes had gotten unfocused and strange. Hand closed the distance between them and grabbed his son’s shoulders to ground him back to the present. Luke had said, oh, ages ago, that people who had the skill to use the Force could have different strengths and weaknesses, and had gone on to say that Ben’s gifts would appear to be more concentrated in the realm of the mind.

No one had really expected that he’d be this gifted with prescience, and not for the first time since he’d kidnapped his son half a decade ago, he wondered what the Old Jedi Order had done about such gifts.

They probably lived protected lives, locked in a corner of the Temple where their visions couldn’t hurt them or anyone else, but then what would have been the use?

Some days he was worried that Ben was so enmeshed in possible futures that he couldn’t see the present, and the sewing had helped so much with that that he’d bankrupted himself on holoclasses and fabrics and tools that first year.

Eventually, Ben’s expression cleared and he leaned forward into Han, letting his father support him. “I can’t go to Luke. My friend-- only he’s  _ not _ my friend-- wants that more than anything. He wants Luke Skywalker  _ dead _ and… and I’ll be the one to do it, some day. But not if I don’t go. Please, Dad, please don’t make me go, please.”

That was a compelling enough argument that Han knew he would absolutely never allow Ben to train with Luke, and he tightened his grip on Ben and rocked him a little.

“Son, I’ve got you,” he whispered, the way he’d whispered to Ben his entire life when his son was upset and shaking like this.

After several minutes, Ben heaved a sigh and then pulled back.

“I still think we should go back to Yavin IV,” Han said.

Ben opened his mouth to protest, but Han continued before he could. “You’re pretty good at this fashion crap, even someone like me can tell that. You know your Uncle Lando owns some sort of designer house, and your mother is a very important person in the Republic: you could have the entire galaxy admiring your work instead of a couple of idiot conmen who want to look rich for their marks. It’s as much of a gift as the stuff you can do with the Force, and I’d have to be the worst father in the universe to keep you back like this.”

“You want to send me back to mother so I can  _ dress _ her?” Ben asked, eyes wide and incredulous.

“If you want. Or dress anyone really. Yourself? Young femme-presenting beings of all shapes? Mascu-presenting? Does it matter?”

Ben squinted, focusing on a point over Han’s shoulder.

“You want to get out of Wild Space before the First Order realizes that we’re  _ those  _ Solos,” he said musingly. “Why the First Order?” he asked again.

“I actually didn’t think that far,” Han said. “But you’ve gotta admit that the Imp factions are starting to consolidate power, and Ben Solo would prove a very tasty target for anyone who thought to put a bounty on your head. Anyone with two braincells to rub together is going to eventually realize that you’re Leia’s kid, and we absolutely can’t have that.”

Ben laughed slightly, and then he shook his head. “I think you’re right, but I’ve got a headache.”

“Kid,” Han began uncomfortably. “No one expects you to see every result of every decision. Sure, it’s a helluva useful knack, but it’s not the most important part of you.”

Ben smiled ruefully at Han, looking a lot older than his nearly fifteen years, and then he said, quietly, “I do kind of miss my mother.”

Han nodded. “That settles it then. I’m taking us home.”

“Yeah,” Ben said, still not quite himself. “Home.”


End file.
